


It's Like a Lithium Ion

by F-117 Nighthawk (F117_Nighthawk)



Series: Dark Matter [2]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Engineering, Gen, Homesick Lance (Voltron), Keith Tries, Pre-Relationship, pre-pre-klance, they figure out a way to communicate with Earth
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-12
Updated: 2017-08-12
Packaged: 2018-12-14 11:54:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,314
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11782617
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/F117_Nighthawk/pseuds/F-117%20Nighthawk
Summary: On their way to the Balmera, Keith runs across a homesick Lance and tries to comfort him. Then he finds Pidge and accidentally gives her an idea and gets roped into helping. It's a win-win though, because in the end he's found a way to help Lance.





	It's Like a Lithium Ion

**Author's Note:**

> I've had this idea since like February but never figure out how to finish it till now. BUT now i have this! and more in this universe! So get ready for an onslaught! (Just a reaaallllyyyyy slow one.)

Lance leaned against the console in an observatory of the castle in his pajamas in the dead of the Castle’s night. He stared up at the stars, billions of little twinkling lights like sequins sewed onto his sister’s dress. He squeezed his eyes shut and shook his head, trying to clear it of thoughts of home. He failed, of course. The whole reason he was up here in the first place was an attempt to be just a tiny bit closer to Earth. Although he didn’t exactly know which way Earth _was_ from here, so for all he knew he was moving further and further away from Earth with every second he sat here. Lance tried not to think about that, though. Down that path was the desire to take Azul and _leave,_ to just _go home,_ and the universe couldn’t afford that.

He focused on the stars winking overhead. The deep purple-black of space was so close to the color of the dress he had last seen Sofia in. He remembered her girlfriend’s fingers tracing the sequins down the arm as Diego gave her a shovel talk, much to Sofia’s embarrassment. Lance pressed his hands to his eyes, blinking back sudden tears. He wasn’t going to be at Sofia’s graduation. He wasn’t going to be able to console his mom and mama when Sofia stood and gave her speech. He wasn’t there to tease her with Diego and Stef about prom and parties and to share celebratory champagne that mom didn’t know about but mama deliberately turned a blind eye to. He sniffed, an ugly sound between a sob and a scream ripping out of his chest.

He just wanted to be home.

“Lance?”

Lance froze at the voice, holding in hiccuping sobs. He didn’t trust himself to speak, or he’d tell whoever it was to go away.

There were quiet footsteps, and a presence knelt next to him. “Hey. Are you okay?”

Lance opened his eyes and saw the absolute last person he would expect next to him. Keith knelt there with an almost constipated expression on his face. It would have been kinda funny, if Lance were so inclined at this moment.

He nodded, hoping Keith would take the hint and just go away.

“You don’t seem like it. What’s wrong?”

Lance gaped at him slightly. What was Keith doing? Was he trying to...to... what was he trying to do? “Nothing. Nothing's wrong,” he stuttered out, attempting to hide the hitch in his voice.

“Lance, I can see you've been crying. Stop denying it and tell me what's wrong.”

“Nothing's wrong! And I'm not crying! I just, uh, got shampoo in my eyes.”

Keith raised an eyebrow, “Your hair isn't wet.”

Lance managed a mock gasp, “Hairdryers exist in space, Keith! They're even better than the ones on Earth because they don't damage your hair! I wouldn't expect you to know though, I doubt you've ever washed that mullet in your life!”

“I'm going to sit here until you actually tell me,” Keith said, settling down next to him, “And I have washed my hair. I did so this morning.”

“Was that the first time ever? Took our first major non-space battle to get you to?”

Keith just gave him a look. “You've touched my mullet. You know it's level of grease.”

“Really? I don't remember that!”

“It was after the battle where we got Scarlet! You were ruffling everyone's hair, even Shiro's and I want to know how you got away with that. You spent like a full minute with you hand in my hair!”

“Well then it was probably all gross and sweaty so how is that an accurate representation of your normal level of grease?”

Keith huffed and crossed his arms. “We're getting off track. I came in here to make sure you were okay, not to bicker about something stupid like _whether I have ever washed my hair. Which I have.”_

“You came in here to- _Me?_ Why?” Lance was incredulous. Keith had walked in here to make sure he was okay? Keith, the emotionless robot? The Paladin incapable of talking to people, much less about feelings? What the _hell_ had happened when he was out?

“Because you were hurt, and I know you're homesick, and I am capable of more emotion than anger, despite what I know you're thinking.” He mumbled something else, but Lance couldn't make it out.

“What?”

“Nothing. Just, spill already.”

Lance considered the other Paladin. Here was Keith, the absolute extreme last person he would have expected to care enough to sit here and bug him. Hell, he’d expect whoever had been the sperm-donor needed to create him before Keith. And yet it was Keith who was sitting next to him.

Well, Shiro _had_ been lecturing him to get to know Keith better. Perhaps it had been delivered to both of them?

“I miss my family. Last time I saw them was Sofia’s mid-year dance and that was months ago. I was supposed to go home for Sofia’s graduation but...”

Lance felt tears in his eyes and buried his head in his knees. “I had the perfect gift for her, a little music box that sounds like waves and the shore like Abuela's house in La Teja. I wanted to see that smile she has when she hears beautiful music. I wanted to get in Diego’s way when he tried to take a picture of her and her girlfriend, I wanted to help Ben and Cora make little baubles for them, I wanted to drink a bottle of wine with Diego and Stef and Sofia and inaugurate her into our little “have fun with your life choices” group. I wanted to comfort Mama when she started crying and stop Mom from crushing Sofia with her hugs and get Uncle Thomas to take a picture of all of us and post it all over the internet because he’s a weirdly-famous youtuber. I just want to hear them laughing and smiling and hugging. I want to be able to give Mama a hug, just one hug, even just a second but I can’t because we’re stuck in space trying to save the universe and they probably think I’m dead.”

Lance was sobbing into his knees again. He thought he should probably be embarrassed that Keith was seeing him like this, but he couldn’t bring himself to care.

“Uhm, do you, do you want me to hug you?”

Lance froze for a second, then snapped his head up to look at Keith.

“I-I-I mean, I’m not really that much of a hugger, and I’m not your family, but Mrs. Holt always told me that touch is a good way to cure loneliness and all that stuff because it releases oxytocin-”

Lance cut him off by wrapping his arms around Keith’s torso and shoving his head into his shoulder. Keith didn’t move and for a moment Lance was certain that he had missed something, but Keith slowly moved his arms to return the hug. Keith was still tense, but Lance wasn’t even sure that Keith was capable of being anything other than tense, so he decided to let it slide. Lance relaxed into the hug, letting out the last vestiges of his emotions on Keith’s shoulder.

They sat there, leaning against the console in the observatory of the main tower until it got a little awkward. When Keith shifted like he wanted to get up, Lance hurriedly sat up. “Sorry. I, uh, yourshoulder’sreallycomfyseeyou,” he said in a rush, and sprinted out of the room, face burning in embarrassment.

Lance ran to his room and hoped that Keith didn’t decide to follow him because there was no way that he was able to outrun the Red Paladin. Slipping into his room, he plopped himself down on his bed and held his head in his hands. Ay por dios, why did he say that? That was like the most embarrassing thing he had ever said.

A comforting warmth nosed its way into his head. _Sleep, little cub,_ Azul whispered, _Everything is always better in the morning._ She wrapped her consciousness around his. Acquiescing to his lion’s wishes, Lance lay down and pulled the sheets over himself. He closed his eyes and attempted to find what had so eluded him that he decided to go up to the observatory.

He swore he could hear his mothers faintly singing.

* * *

Keith stared after Lance, wondering what had just happened. He had moved to readjust his legs and Lance had suddenly shot up, rambled something incoherent, and ran out of the room. He found himself surprisingly worried about the other Paladin. Lance had seemed a little out of it ever since he had been released from the cryopod. He wondered it if was just homesickness, or if there was something more to it.

Keith stood and wandered in the general direction of the training room while pondering this question. Lance was homesick, that much was obvious. Keith couldn’t really relate. His biological parents had disappeared before he was six, he had been bumped from foster home to foster home until the one where he had run into Shiro and eventually adopted by his family, then Shiro’s mom had died when they were both at the Garrison. The Holts had taken them in, but Keith had never connected with anyone other than Shiro. Shiro was his family, and Shiro was up here with them. He had never really connected a place to the word “home.” The closest he had come to that was his little shack in the desert.

His thoughts were interrupted by a crash and a “Shit! Motherfucking quiznak!” coming from a room to his left and back slightly. Stopping, Keith turned around and poked his head in the room. Pidge was sitting at a desk, glaring at something metal that had fallen off the desk. The bit of metal had a bunch of wires connected to Pidge’s computer, some of which had been pulled out. Keith walked in and picked it up. Turning it over in his hands, he realized that it sort of looked like a satellite dish. “What is this?”

“Trying to see if we can send or receive signals from Earth. I think we move around too much to consistently receive signals but if I can rig something that lets us receive even a little then we may be able to send...”

Keith no longer had any interest in the training room or sending Pidge to bed. “How can I help?”

* * *

Hunk stepped into the lab to get Pidge for breakfast only to find Pidge jittering excitedly and Keith passed out on the desk.

“Pidge? Why are you bouncing around like an electron? And why is Keith asleep on the desk? Please tell me he’s asleep and you didn’t manage to kill him by blowing something up.”

“Because it worked!”

“What worked?”

Pidge grabbed Hunk’s hand and dragged him over to her computer. “I got a signal! I got five minutes of the original Marvel: Superheroes series! It’s a Thor episode!”

Hunk finally noticed the device that Keith was holding on his chest. It seemed like a satellite and was connected by a mass of small wires to Pidge’s computer. “Holy crap, Pidge! With that thing? Here, there must be a way to get a longer signal.”

* * *

Coran wandered the halls looking for Hunk, Pidge, and Keith. He had sent Hunk to grab Pidge for breakfast several dobashes ago; neither had showed up in the dining room. Shiro had reported that Keith was neither in his room nor the training deck, which was highly unusual. The non-missing members of the team were scouring the ship for the three.

“No, Hunk, that has to stay there otherwise it won’t pick it up at all.”

“Ow! Pidge, watch where you’re pointing that thing.”

“Keith, stop fidgeting and hold it!”

Coran poked his head into the room that the voices were emanating from. Keith was sitting on a desk holding something, which Pidge and Hunk were arguing over while moving bits of metal around.

“What is going on in here?”

“We’re trying to see if we can pick up any signals from Earth,” Hunk said, not looking up from where he was soldering a wire.

“Oooo, so you are attempting to recreate Earth technology?”

“Yeah,” Pidge said, standing up to stretch her back and arms, “I was trying to see if we could send a signal, but Earth tech won’t reach that far. The only signal we’ve picked up is from a hundred and fifty years ago.”

“Hmm, there must be a way to navigate around that...”

* * *

Allura finally had the bright idea to check the Castle’s security systems for the four who were nowhere to be found.

“They have to be somewhere,” she told Shiro, who was looking over her shoulder, “All the lions and pods are accounted for, and there are no signs of forced entry or exit.”

“Why didn’t we think of this before we sent Coran?” Lance asked from where he was slumped in his chair, idly flipping through the more obscure cameras, “This ship is huge, it makes much more sense to look through the cameras than go searching through every wing.”

“We don’t have cameras everywhere, and some of them have broken in the past ten thousand years. I had assumed that they were in their rooms when I sent Coran to find them. Apparently they weren't. Shiro,” the Princess paused, glaring up at Shiro, “why don’t you look through the cameras instead of hovering over my shoulder. They’re _fine_ and still in the castle.”

“Right, yeah, sorry, Princess.”

* * *

“Hey, Pidge?”

“Yeah, Keith?”

“Do you think it would be possible to set up a link back to Earth? We could send messages a lot easier if we had some Altean tech on the planet than if we had to deal with Earth tech.”

Pidge stopped working for a moment and glared down at the contraption that Keith was still somehow holding onto. “Possibly.......”

“Well we’d have to send whatever in a drone as the Galra could track the Castle through space a lot easier than a drone. We can’t risk the Empire finding Earth,” Coran cut in.

“We’ll be moving around alot so whatever tech we put on Earth probably wouldn’t be able to communicate back to us without giving away its coordinates,” Pidge added on, “but we may be able to communicate one-way.”

“I bet we can build a camera and record stuff with it, then send the files in small bursts to they’re less likely to track the location,” Hunk thought outloud.

“Could we build three receivers and be able to send to only one of them if we want? One for Lance’s family, one for Hunk’s, and one for yours?”

“Mom’s your family too, Keith,” Pidge punched him in the arm as she spoke, “You and Shiro hung out enough at our house for at least that.”

“We’d be sending using the Castle’s comm system.... Pidge toss me that holopad.”

Keith smiled. This was just what they needed, some way to at least get a message back to Earth. Lance would hopefully be less homesick if this worked, and they all would have some way of reassuring their families they were okay. He had no intention of using it, though.

* * *

“Found them! They’re in some lab.”

Allura and Shiro rushed over to Lance’s chair. He had the camera feed from a lab open on his monitor, showcasing Pidge, Hunk, and Coran rushing around with tools and scraps of metal, while Keith sat in the center holding what looked like a sphere of metal and looking very bored.

“What in the universe are they doing?”

“Building something?”

“What room is that, Lance?”

Lance poked at his controls, “Uhhh the third engineering lab. I think it’s by Jade’s hangar?”

“Well, let’s go see what was so interesting no one came to breakfast.”

* * *

“Hydrospanner.”

“Here you go.”

“Other one, Coran.”

“Pidge, find me more wires, these aren’t long enough.”

“Find them yourself, I’m busy with this code.”

“Keith, stop fidgeting!”

“Sorry! I didn’t get a chance to do my morning training and I’m kinda hungry.”

“How are the receivers coming, Coran?”

“Almost finished! Just got to soldier the last bits together.”

“Move your hands, I don’t wanna burn you.”

“We should make phones when we’re done here so we don’t always have to use our helmets.”

“Hunk, plug that thing into my laptop.”

* * *

When Lance, Allura, and Shiro got down to the engineering lab they discovered an absolute mess. There were stray wires everywhere, metal plating strewn about the room, tools anywhere but their bins, various connectors all over the floor, and a number of things none of them had any idea what they were. Standing triumphant in the middle of it all were the four wayward people.

“Guys! Guess what we just built and got working!”

“You’ve been in here all day? We spent the past four hours looking for you!” Shiro cried, waving his arms at the mess.

“Yeah, but it was important! Look, we’ve got these three receivers and this one camera-sender! I'm calling them Electron and Protons!”

Pidge and Hunk bounced around the room and held one of the smaller balls up and the big one. “See this small one can project a video recording hologram, and this big one records and sends it to the receivers! It can also send files it didn’t record, so if we say recorded something with the castle cameras we can send it to the receivers. See?”

Hunk pressed something on the big ball and the small ball beeped, green light blinking. Pidge pressed a button on it and projected a holoscreen. On screen Pidge was fiddling with something out of view, while Hunk and Coran stood over her. The camera shifted as Pidge stood up and said _“Keith you can let go of it now.”_

The view bobbed up and Keith stepped around the device into view. _“It seems like it’s working?”_

_“This side is, now we just gotta send it to the other side.”_

The hologram shut off, Pidge and Hunk jittering behind the balls. Shiro and Allura blinked at the balls while Lance poked at them. “Why exactly did you build these?”

“Well it started because I was trying to see if we could pick up any of those transmissions they sent out in the early 20th century and Keith came by, I think he was gonna tell me to go to bed but he got distracted by what I was doing, and generously offered to be my human workstation before he _fell asleep,”_ Pidge turned to send a mock glare at Keith before continuing, “and then Hunk came by and Keith woke up and Coran came in and Keith suggested that maybe we could build something to communicate with Earth and we started thinking of all the problems with that and how we could navigate around them and here we are!”

“Wait wait wait, you want to communicate with Earth?” Shiro asked, “isn’t that dangerous?”

“Well possibly, but we managed to rig it so that there’s as little actual communication as possible,” Hunk explained, “Video is pre-recorded on the big one and then sent as a burst in these things’ direction. Little chance of interception, little chance of corruption too. We hook these things up to a drone, wormhole it to Earth, drop it somewhere our families can get to it, hope NASA doesn’t blow it up on entry.”

“Wait, so... you’re saying we could tell our families we’re okay?” Lance’s quiet voice cut through Hunk’s babble.

“Yeah, buddy.”

Lance turned to face Allura and Shiro and let out a shaky “Please?”

They both took one look at Lance’s face and said “Alright” at the same time.

“YES!” Pidge yelled, pumping her arms in the air. “Okay, let’s record one message with all of us right now, then I can program a drone to land in my backyard and Mom can get the receivers where they need to go.”

"Why Electron and Protons?" Lance asked Pidge as the group made its way to the common room.

"Because it's like a lithium ion! Electron moves around the Protons, and we're the electron, and Earth is the Protons."

* * *

“Alright, start recording.”

Pidge, Hunk, and Lance were sitting on the couch in the common room, the camera orb which Pidge had named Electron floating in front of them. Shiro was sitting behind them on the walkway, legs crossed.

“Keith, get in the frame,” Shiro called. Keith was leaning against the wall just out of view of Electron’s camera. Keith sighed, but moved and sat next to Shiro, hunched over on himself.

“Why do I have to be in camera but A-”

“Shhh! Surprise, dummy!” Pidge reprimanded him. Keith rolled his eyes but acquiesced.

“Uhm, how do we start this?” Hunk asked the room in general.

“Maybe you should start with ‘hi, we’re okay’,” Shiro suggested.

“Right okay, uh, hi Mom! We’re all okay! I’ve got Shiro and Keith here too.” Pidge started. Shiro waved from his seat with a smile, Keith just gave a small salute.

“I’m here too, Mom, Dad.”

“Hola, Mamá, Mom! Estoy todo bien.”

“Um, so. This is gonna be really hard to explain.”

“Start from the beginning.”

“I mean I guess the beginning is technically Kerberos,” Pidge said, looking up at Shiro, “but I’m not sure how much detail of that we wanna say or even how much you remember.”

Shiro hesitated a minute. “Guess I’ll start our explanation then. I’m pretty sure you all know about the Kerberos mission. Well, it wasn’t pilot error that downed us. It was aliens. Long story that I remember almost none of short, I escaped and crash landed an alien ship just outside of the Garrison. And that’s where these four come in.” He gestured to the other four Paladins.

“We were outside because of.... Reasons.”

“Lance wanted to do some late-night team bonding and we followed Pidge up to the roof,” Hunk interrupted Lance.

Not missing a beat, Lance continued: “And we saw Shiro’s ship crash and went to investigate when this guy,” he tipped his head back and glared up at Keith, “broke into the compound they had set up and of course we weren’t going to let Keith Kogane one-up us so we somehow ended up tagging along,”

“We ended up out in the desert and through perhaps the best conspiracy theory ever found a giant alien mechanical blue lion. Oooo, we should go down to the hangar and show them the Lions!”

“How about after the story, Pidge,” Keith interrupted.

Pidge shrugged an assent and continued. “Then Lance accidentally activated the thing’s autopilot, we flew around, shot up into space, destroyed an alien warship that was about to attack Earth, then went through this weird wormhole thing to a completely different galaxy and woke up an alien princess.”

Allura took this as her cue to step into the frame. She sat on Shiro’s other side, dangling her legs by Pidge. “Hello!” she waved, “I’m Princess Allura of Altea.”

“Allura told us there were more Lions and that they formed this really cool robot called Voltron and we all got Lions and then we blew up even more alien warships and a bunch of other stuff happened but now we’re the Voltron Paladins, the Defenders of the Universe.”

“We can’t risk coming back, no matter how much we want to. We can’t risk the Galran Empire finding Earth’s location. We’re taking a huge risk sending this message in the first place,” Shiro said, dimming the others’ enthusiasm a bit, “They’ve already gotten to Earth once, following Azul’s elemental signature. Don’t worry about us, though, we’ll be fine. The Lions are formidable, as is the Castle. We’re safe as we can get, fighting a war.”

“Lance already got blown up once, Shiro, we’re not all that safe.”

“Keith! You’re gonna scare my moms! Don’t you _dare_ mention that on video! Pidge, you can cut that out right?”

Pidge resisted the urge to roll her eyes but nodded.

“Alright now that Pidge has _cut that out, seriously Keith-_ uh, do we have anything else to say?”

They all paused. Hunk turned to the screen first. “Make sure Grandma’s okay, alright Dad? Show her this if you can. And-and keep making that Fa'apapa I love, okay? I know Mom loves it too and I can’t bear the thought of you not making it if I’m not there. Both of you keep cooking, I want to taste all your new recipes when we get back. And we need to feed them to Keith, the guy subsisted on peanut butter and rations for a year.”

“Can we stop bringing my eating habits up? It was literally all that I had!” Keith threw his hands in the air exasperated. The Paladins and Allura collapsed in fits of giggles. Keith pouted and crossed his arms, but there was a small hint of a smile on his face.

Still laughing, Shiro pulled him into a sideways hug. “Ah, you know we love you, Keith, but I have lived on rations for a year and trust me, peanut butter is not a good addition to them.”

Lance quieted, before launching into Spanish. The Lions provided a translation for the Paladins: “Sofia, I’m sorry I can’t be there for your graduation. I wanted to do the whole tradition with you and everyone, but I guess I can’t. Just know that I’m sure your speech will be amazing and that you’ll look beautiful and I love you and I’m proud of you. Yes I’m allowed to act like a big brother, you’re only five minutes older than me. Oh, and I’m guessing the Garrison gave Mom all my stuff; there should be a small white and blue music box in there. That’s your graduation present.

“Stef, you keep going with that business degree; you’ll do amazing and you’re like the smartest person I know. A real life Pepper Potts. Wow I’m glad I can’t hear you laughing at me for using a hundred year old movies as examples, but seriously, you’re like Pepper. Go find yourself a Tony Stark and you’ll do great.

“Diego, you still chasing Reese? Nah, I know you are, he’s perfect for you. I hope you’re still in the school, whenever I went to pick you up from work all the kids loved you. Don’t give up on it, they all love you and I can tell you love it.

“Ben, keep drawing. I love your spaceships. I had one in my pocket when Azul brought us out here and I have it taped to my wall. And your dragons are so cool, you people are amazing, I just love your style and don’t you dare stop just because I’m not there to give you motivation.

“Cora, just keep exploring, okay? Don’t let anything stop you from doing what you want to do. I know I’m not there to yell at people that don’t want you to do things, but I think you can do it yourself.

“Mom, Mamá, I miss you a lot. I really just want a hug, but that’s not exactly possible right now. Take care of each other and everyone else, okay? I love you all.”

Lance had the most open, earnest, homesick expression any of the Paladins had ever seen on his face. Keith extended a hand and placed it gently on Lance’s shoulder, startling him into looking up. Keith just squeezed and let go.

Pidge was up next. “Mom, I went to the Garrison to find Dad and Matt, but somehow I ended up here, and honestly I think up here I’ll have a better chance of finding them. We know they were taken by the Empire so I’ve been hacking into the records of every ship we come across and searching for them. When I find them, I’ll let you know. And don’t worry about me, okay? I can take care of myself, and I’ve got Shiro and Keith too. Almost as good as Matt, eh?”

There was a pause where nobody talked, until Pidge looked up. “Shiro, Keith, you gonna say anything to Mom?”

Keith shook his head, Shiro shrugged. “I don’t have anything to add to what you said. We’re okay, we’re gonna find Sam and Matt, that’s about it.”

“Alright. Oh, were we gonna take Electron and record a bit of the Lions?”

“Why don’t we save that for later, Paladins!” Coran’s voice rang out, “It’s dinner time!”

There was a collective groan. “Hunk, please go make sure Coran hasn’t created something poisonous or something,” Lance mumbled into the couch.

“On it,” Hunk sighed, standing up and walking towards the kitchen.

“I guess we should wrap this up. Mom, all three receivers should be in the pod we’re sending to the house. One of them has a giant L on it, one a H, and one a K. Keep the one with the K, send the one with the L to the Espinosa family, and the H one to the Garrett family. I’ll have Hunk and Lance write their addresses on a note and stick it in the pod. Get them where they need to go, okay? We’ll be sending more of these when we can.”

“Alright, Team Voltron, signing off,” Shiro said, leaning forward and pushing the end recording button. “Pidge, we’ll send this after dinner.”

* * *

“Hey, Keith?” Lance said, sitting down next to the other boy.

Keith looked up from the holopad he was attempting to read an Altean book on (the writing translation provided by the Lions wasn’t as good as spoken). He was sitting alone in the common room, likely after Shiro had kicked him out of the training room. Lance had shuffled in in his robe and slippers; he had been trying to go to bed but there was a question nagging in his brain. “What’s up, Lance?”

“Pidge said you came up with the idea to make Electron and the Protons.”

“Uhm, kinda? I just asked if it was possible.”

“Why though?”

Keith looked confused and Lance squirmed, worried he’d asked something the wrong way. He just wanted to know why Keith had suggested it. “Well, I guess... I was thinking about you and how homesick you were last night, and how Mrs. Holt is probably a mess because now Pidge is gone and I’m gone and I don’t know your family or Hunk’s family but they’re probably worried sick, and the Garrison probably told them you were dead and I just....I know what it’s like to lose people, Lance. They deserve to know you’re alive, and you deserve to be able to know they’re capable of listening when you want.”

Keith was staring down at his hands, a faraway look in his eyes. Lance considered what he had said. He seemed genuinely pained at the thought of their families losing more people, and like Lance’s homesickness had been a sort of catalyst for him to come up with something to help them all. Lance thought of what little he knew about the other boy, how little people he had talked to at the Garrison, the rumors surrounding Keith and his orphan status, how Shiro seemed to be the only one that could get a laugh out of the Red Paladin.

Cautiously, Lance leaned over and wrapped his arms around Keith. He stiffened for a moment, but relaxed and moved an arm around Lance’s back. “Thanks, Keith.”

“You’re welcome.”

Lance thought he heard a hint of a smile in Keith’s voice, and vowed right then and there that he was going to figure out how to get Keith to smile if it was the last thing he did.

**Author's Note:**

> Keith tries, okay?  
> I really like this idea and I have more things that end with one or more of the Paladins recording things and sending them to the Protons (and Lance accidentally starts a prank war using them hehehe I should write that one next)


End file.
